As late as November 1918 the fate of the country was still up for grabs, and the Bolshevik alternative was attractive to all those for whom a social revolution promised a new life.

Re-formed in the rear, they fought against Anton Ivanovich Denikin, Nikolay Yudenich, and Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel.

[2] After the souring and dissolution of Nestor Makhno's Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine's alliance with the Bolsheviks, captured Red commanders and commissars were summarily executed.

However, Makhno usually preferred to release the disarmed enlisted men that were captured, as "proletarian brothers", with a choice of joining his army or returning home, after all commanding officers were executed.

[5] The problem was further compounded by the alienation of the Estonians by Anton Denikin's inflexible Russian chauvinism and their refusal to fight with Nikolai Yudenich.